Rapist apologizes to his victim

WEST CHESTER — The Caln man who raped a woman he met in West Chester while bar-hopping got his chance to express remorse to the victim for his criminal behavior last week.

But the woman, who told police her assailant had forced her to have sex with him after he promised her a ride home, was not present to hear his apology.

“She wants to get this behind her,” said Assistant District Attorney Carlos Barraza, the prosecutor who handled the formal sentencing Friday for defendant Michael Sugg in Common Pleas Court, explaining her absence. “It was a traumatic experience for her.”

Sugg, 26, who had pleaded guilty to rape charges in June in exchange for a 3˝- to eight-year state prison sentence, nevertheless expressed guilt over what he had done. “He is ready to do what he has to do to make amends to the victim in this case,” said Assistant Public Defender Loreen Kemps, who represented Sugg in the case.

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“I just would like to apologize for my actions to the victim,” Sugg told Judge Jacqueline C. Cody. “I am truly sorry for what she had to go through.”

Sugg said he had struggled with alcohol problems for years before the incident, and that it had “played a part in my life that led me to make choices I am very regrettable for. I hope this is going to be a wake-up call for me.”

Sugg’s sentence was lighter than what he could have received under the maximum penalties for rape, a violent felony. But Barraza said that the victim had been accepting of the lesser term because Sugg had admitted what he had done was to rape her, not simply assault her.

“She felt this was an appropriate amount of jail time for the defendant,” he told Cody during the hearing. “He accepted responsibility for what he did. For her, that was a very important thing. She wanted him to say that what he did was rape.”

The attack took place around 2 a.m. on March 20, 2011 in the 300 block of Patton Alley off North New Street in West Chester. The then 23-year-old victim, whose name is being withheld because of the nature of the crime, had called West Chester police to report she had been raped by a man she had met just a few a few hours before and knew only as Mike.

The woman said she had met Sugg at a bar on East Market Street in West Chester and that they danced together there and then went to another borough bar, on West Gay Street. The woman said that at closing time she had told Sugg that she needed a ride home. He suggested that his brother could help her but they would have to walk to meet him at a nearby parking lot at North Darlington and West Chestnut streets.

As the woman and Sugg walked to where he said his brother was waiting, however, she grew suspicious of him and sent a text message to a friend on her cell phone saying, “Help me.”

When they got to an alleyway parking area, Sugg pushed her against a car. She told him she was not going to have sex with him, but he threw her to the ground and attacked her, smacking her in the face while forcing her to have sex.

She dialed her cell phone during the attack, Krilivsky told Cody, and her friend heard her shout, “No! Stop!” and could hear Sugg shouting at her. After the alleged attack, she called police on her cell phone while Sugg walked east down the alley.

About 30 minutes after the attack, a West Goshen officer stopped Sugg walking in the 800 block of Goshen Road, about 1˝ miles away, near Chester County Hospital. The victim then identified Sugg as the man who had assaulted her.

After his plea in June, Sugg underwent an evaluation by the state Sexual Offender’s Assessment Board to determine whether his address should be given to neighbors when he is released from state prison. The panel determined he did not fit that profile under the state’s Megan’s Law.

Cody, in accepting the plea and formally sentencing Sugg, suggested he take the opportunity of prison time to counsel other inmates on making good choices.

“You sound sincere” in expressing remorse, she said. “I wish the victim could be here. (The crime) does not seem consistent with what you have done in your life.

“But now it is up to you to make sue this does not define your life. It is up to you to make sure it never happens again.”